The imperialist war preparation and the communist movement’s situation
Dear comrades,
First of all, we would like to thank the Communist Party of Greece (Marxist-Leninist) for the organization of this international meeting of various revolutionary organizations. This is a very important initiative, especially in times when the communist movement is as weak as its international connections. We are sure that today we can organize one step forward for the communist movement and hope that we can advance the anti -militaristic struggle with common activities.
“Which contradictions are shaking the planet and producing wars? What is the direction of reconstruction of the revolutionary communist movement and the struggle of the peoples?” From our point of view, these initial questions of today's discussion are exactly right, because they link two of the most burning issues, namely the imperialist preparations for war and the lack of strong, combatant revolutionary parties of the working class in most countries of the world.
In our contribution, we want to outline the proposals we are making to overcome this state of affairs and truly turn imperialism into the age of proletarian revolution.
The war in Ukraine represents a turning point in the development of inter-imperialist contradictions. It has created a new status quo, a point of no return so to say. Preparations for another major imperialist war of distribution have begun.
What constitutes this new status quo and what does it mean for the powerful states in the imperialist world system?
All imperialist states are increasingly arming themselves. This applies in particular to those that have shown the tendency to limit or neglect the development of their military capacities for a long time, such as Japan or Germany. In its “Zeitenwende” (Turning Point) program shortly after the start of the war in Ukraine, Germany took on 100 billion euros in new debt for its army and intends to further increase its military budget.
The encompassing militarization is also reflected in the debates about the level of the minimum financial obligations of NATO countries in terms of their military spending. The two percent of GDP target has thus become a minimum. In Germany, for example, the Green Party is calling for this to be raised to 3.5 percent during the election campaign, which would almost double the military budget.
Meanwhile, the foreign policy of the imperialist states is aimed at improving their position for a third world war. They are withdrawing from strategically less important areas of operation and concentrating on their core area of power and strategically important points. For example, the USA is concentrating on the dispute with China over Taiwan and the Pacific. Germany is withdrawing from costly foreign missions and concentrating on building up its military forces in Europe, for example with a new base in Lithuania.
As a result, regional capitalist powers are also gaining momentum and trying to improve their position through wars and conquests, such as Israel and Iran in Lebanon, Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh or Turkey in Syria.
We can therefore see how imperialism is moving towards a third world war and turning the world into a battlefield once again.
The following also applies: “Imperialism is aggression outwards, reaction inwards”. The preparations for war, which encompass all capitalist countries, also mean more difficult fighting conditions for us as communists. Internal militarization, the restriction of political freedoms, economic attacks on the working class and the strengthening of fascist political forces are all part of the development of war preparations. We must be prepared for this in our reconstruction process.
At the same time, the developments outlined above also means that anti-militarism will be a central, in fact the central, field of struggle for the political struggle of the working class in the coming period.
What do the preparations for war mean for us communists? In its program, our organization states the following about the situation of the international communist movement: “Internationally, there are today only a small number of Marxist-Leninist forces working seriously toward the conquest of power by the working class in a revolutionary civil war. Many organizations have so far failed to rise above the level of a relatively narrow circle or, depressed by decades of setbacks, have fallen into the rut of reformism and become completely absorbed in the day-to-day petty work.“[1]
The communist movement is in a phase of historical weakness. There is a lack of powerful communist parties in most countries that can mobilize the masses and lead them in struggle. At the same time, the present time presents us with great tasks all over the world. Ultimately, it is a question of fighting effectively against the militarization of our countries in preparation for major imperialist wars of distribution and the increasing fascization in conjunction with this process.
In addition, the state of the labor movement in many countries is hardly any better. There have been repeated actions here and there against arms shipments to Ukraine or Israel.
There is also hope that the international solidarity movement with the Palestinian people has played its part in discrediting Israel and the current ceasefire. However, this movement has also repeatedly lacked a clear, anti-imperialist direction and a connection to the working class.
But this resistance is still far from being as developed as it should be. Major class struggles and, above all, concrete victories against the war are still lacking. A proletarian anti-war movement and a communist, anti-imperialist resistance are lacking.
In the following we want to look at how we can organize this resistance. First, we want to clarify some basic positions in order to be able to deal with some current tasks of the communist movement later. Finally, we will also discuss questions of international cooperation between communists.
During the First World War, the communists, led by the Russian Bolsheviks with the great Lenin at their head, worked out the tactical principles of the communist movement in the struggle against militarism and imperialist war.
On the one hand, this is revolutionary defeatism, the struggle for the defeat of one's own imperialist government. This position was attacked by the Luxemburgists, among others, who did not care much about the victory or defeat of the imperialist fatherland.
The Bolsheviks, on the other hand, proved that it was precisely the struggle for the defeat of one's own government through sabotage, strikes, refusal of soldiers, fraternization at the front, etc. that could create the best conditions for the victory of the socialist revolution.
Secondly, the Bolsheviks set themselves the task of transforming the imperialist war into a civil war to overthrow capitalism and build socialism. They successfully accomplished this task.
It is also important to emphasize here that the Bolsheviks were not popular for their positions at the time. On the one hand, at the beginning of the war they still had to fight against war-mongering in the class; on the other hand, the overwhelming majority of international social democracy had gone over to the side of social chauvinism. Like us today, they found themselves in a situation of ideological encirclement, in which their principled communist positions earned them many attacks.
In retroperspective Stalin wrote regarding this process:
“The agitation against the war that we conducted among the workers and soldiers at the beginning of 1917, under Kerensky, undoubtedly resulted in a tactical setback, for the masses dragged our speakers off the platforms, beat them up, and sometimes tore them limb from limb; instead of the masses being drawn into the Party, they drew away from it. But in spite of the tactical setback, this agitation brought nearer a big strategic success, for the masses soon realised that we were right in agitating against the war, and later this hastened and facilitated their going over to the side of the Party.”[2]
It would be easy to simply dismiss the basic positions described above with reference to the weakness of the communist movement. But this would lead to losing the basic communist orientation on questions of war and slipping into reformism. After all, we communists must be concerned in every situation with improving the conditions for the victory of the working class (revolutionary defeatism). Moreover, it remains true that only the socialist revolution can put a lasting end to the imperialist war.
If we really want to realize our dreams of revolution and socialism, we must set ourselves the great goal of building communist parties and an anti-imperialist anti-war movement. But this can only happen on the basis of communist principles.
Nevertheless, we cannot deny that the situation of our movement poses major problems. Above all, it presents us with the task of pursuing a long-term project to build up the communist movement on the one hand, and building effective resistance against imperialism and preparations for war today on the other.
In our view, both tasks are dialectically linked and can only be realized together.
The key issue here is the structure of communist parties, which do not exist in most countries in the world today, particularly in Europe. For us, a communist party is defined above all by the following qualities:
- It is a cadre party with a core of professional revolutionaries.
- Its basis is a communist program that is based on the creative application of Marxist-Leninist ideology and corresponds to the conditions of struggle in its country.
- It has a democratic-centralist organizational structure and a network of mass and peripheral organizations, for example a Communist Youth Organization, but also much more open areas of work.
- It organizes the most progressive section of the working class and is linked through it to the rest of the class in order to set it in motion in times of revolutionary crisis.
- It has a communist women's organization that leads the struggle for women's liberation inside and outside the organization.
- It combines legal and illegal forms of struggle, is able to apply them and has the necessary covert organizational structures.
- It adopts a style of work that combines the “Russian revolutionary impetus” and “American practicality”, i.e. it participates in class struggles and spontaneous movements with an avantgarde approach and at the same time does not lose sight of the interests of party building.
The existence or non-existence of such an organization also determines whether the working class can oppose the imperialist war or is once again put through the meat grinder. Without an organization with the necessary covert structures, it will not be possible to remain active in the moment of a probable illegalization of the communist movement. On the other hand, without a connection to the working class and mass organizations that are as open as possible, it will not be possible to set the class in motion. Without programmatic, strategic and tactical clarity, a communist leadership will not be able to define a path from here to revolution; without a democratic-centralist organization and revolutionary cadres, it will not be possible to take it, etc.
The model of the “two phases of party building” is known from the analysis of the Bolsheviks' party history. Stalin defined these phases as follows:
“a) To win the vanguard of the proletariat to the side of communism (i.e., build up cadres, create a Communist Party, work out the programme, the principles of tactics). Propaganda as the chief form of activity.
Many comrades make the mistake of using this correct evaluation as justification to launch an organization that is only dedicated to propaganda, the creation of texts, criticizing revisionist views, ideological training, etc. In reality, however, this phase is about winning over cadres of the party, mainly through propaganda.
In reality, however, the described phase is mainly about winning over the part’s cadres, mainly by convincing them, precisely through propaganda - but this takes place in connection with and in the class struggle. Neither party nor cadre can emerge without experience of struggle. To distinguish schematically between winning over cadres and developing a programme on the one hand and leading class struggles on the other is not only undialectical, but will not lead to building an organization capable of fighting. The Bolsheviks also took part in or led armed strikes in the first phase of party building, in which propaganda was the basic form of their work.
Accordingly, we must also link the struggle against war preparations with the struggle to build communist parties. On the one hand, because this allows us to grow as organizations and develop further. On the other hand, because we can defend and expand our own scope in the struggle against rearmament.
In addition to building our own organization in the class struggle, we want to emphasize the following tasks in the struggle against militarism:
The struggle against international war preparations can only be successful as a joint effort of revolutionaries, communists and antimilitarists around the world. That is why we want to welcome once again the initiative of the KKE (m-l), which has created this forum.
We continue to need forms of international exchange, which should above all serve the development of revolutionary practice and a proletarian anti-war movement.
At the same time, we also need joint days of action and coordinated activities on specific occasions or against specific actors in the imperialist war effort. Specifically, we want to propose developing joint activities in the coming months as part of the “Resist NATO!” campaign against the NATO summit in The Hague in June.
In addition, we would like to establish further contact with all the organizations present, gain new allies and organize further conferences at which we can define common priorities for our communist antimilitarism.
Long live proletarian internationalism! Let's develop communist resistance against militarism!
[1]https://komaufbau.org/communist-program/
[2]Stalin – The Political Strategy and Tactics of the Russian Communists
[3]Stalin – The Political Strategy and Tactics of the Russian Communists
